Chapter 452

Chapter 452

Thera’s agreement was swift. How could she decline? Even if she didn’t care too much about advancing farther into the library, this was a request to them as rank-one adventurers, off to protect one of the most important figures in the world. It was the sort of thing she dreamed of when she’d first started, now waiting to be fulfilled.The inaugural upload of this chapter took place via N0v3l-B1n.

It was obvious she was itching to take on the task now that it had been given, but they weren’t exactly being rushed for it either. There were still a couple days to go before they needed to head out. Days Ben fully intended to put to use in the top floors of the library.

His god sighed in his head as Ben flipped through the books on the fifth floor, taking them slower than he had on the third to try and savour the wealth of knowledge they contained, even if it still left him going at an outrageous pace.

Hey, I absolutely held my own I’ll have you know. I’m like, properly powerful now.

We’re ignoring that. Instead, do me a favour and get me access to the basement. I want to know what’s so special to be hidden away like that.

He’d been told he needed permission from the gods, but he was someone lucky enough to be on good terms with more than a few. He was absolutely going to abuse that for all it was worth. Or at least he was going to try.

Boo. Why not? I’m such a good little apostle who just helped the entire world become more powerful, I deserve this.

Yeah, and if I’d known about how hard it was getting into the basement then I would have tried to force that too. What’s the big deal?

Obviously. This is a library, Myriad.

His god sighed.

Hey, calling knowledge good or bad is close-minded. It all comes down to how you use it. I promise I wouldn’t abuse anything I learn.

So incredibly lame. He sighed as he put away all of the books on soul magic that floor contained, sitting back briefly to take it all in since it didn’t seem he’d wear down his god.

I can never get soul magic myself and if I wanted to use someone else’s then that would mean awakening both enchanting and connect which is just not happening. Maybe I could get really lucky and awaken both together into one new skill, but even still, the odds are low.

It wasn’t like he hadn’t ever let himself imagine such things. Honestly, it was hard to stop himself from theory-crafting just how to push any over the edge if he ever got them high enough, but if he was being honest with himself, he really only thought there were a couple that had a slim chance.

Despite being the newest to awaken, it was his knowledge skill that made it to the top of the list, given that raising it just meant learning as much as he could and then applying his knowledge enough to push it past its limits, something he genuinely believed might be possible, leaving the rest of his skills up in the air in probability. It wasn’t like there was no chance, he just wasn’t willing to bet on any of them was all.

Well, I’ll just keep doing what I’m doing. He sighed. That’s enough reflecting anyway. Back to reading while I can.

With everything on soul magic finished, that left him with two choices for what to do next, either the deeply researched signature spells that some mages had spent their lives on, or else move to the information on other tier-three skills that had existed throughout history.

He knew what would be more valuable to him but gave in to what he was most curious about in the end. His prior train of thought couldn’t help but put him in the mood to see what others had achieved and he pulled out the books to see exactly that, reading the entire shelf in minutes and feeling it capture his imagination.

In the thousands of years the world had stood, less than a hundred individuals had reached the third tier of a skill, at least as long as the soul mages weren’t counted in the tally.

At first Ben thought something must have been missing. Surely that number was a little too low, but the more he thought about it, the more sense it made. It wasn’t considered a monumental wall for nothing, and the lifespan extension that achieving it would provide was great. There were easily races on the world who would live close to, if not more than, a thousand years if they reached the third tier at a young enough age.

Even with the soul mages doing their best to help others break through, that didn’t mean their efforts would bear fruit either. It was easy to imagine decades being spent to raise someone up, only for them to never cross that finish line.

Which really just goes to show how hard it is. Is Falk going to manage it? Our design was as good as it could be, it’s just passed the threshold of what should be possible for him, but will that be enough?

Among the books was a couple on the soulsmith, the one with the very same skill his teacher was striving for, but it granted no clues on that front. It offered plenty of valuable information on just what the skill could manage, along with the skills and jobs that went into getting to that point and had gone on to become available after, but it left out what he personally considered the exceptionally important bit that was the act that pushed it past its limits.

Stop worrying about it. If it doesn’t work then we’ll think of something else. Or I’ll just try and convince Sonya to corner him and see if he’ll cave under pressure.

He could worry about it if it failed, for the time being, he was going to focus on his own growth, taking in the records of all of the skills that had made it to their pinnacle, magics and combat ones, along with far stranger options, before finishing up that floor in its entirety, taking it in and moving on to the fourth with the time he had left.